Nurx App to Give Out Free Birth Control

Thanks, Trump.

As soon as President Trump was elected to office, many assumed there was a possibility that birth control could get more expensive, since he had campaigned vigorously on a promise to repeal the Affordable Care Act. That possibility came closer to reality when Trump signed an executive order that would potentially make it easier for employers to ask for religion-based exemptions from health-care mandates under the Affordable Care Act, like those that require birth control coverage. And earlier this week, there was a reported leak of a White House regulation draft that indicated Trump could more specifically address religious-based exemptions for birth control coverage, essentially allowing any employer to refuse to abide by the mandate if they disagree with it on religious or moral grounds.

In what they say is a response to the threats facing birth control accessibility as a result of Trump's policies, Nurx, a tele-medicine startup, is offering a $30 credit, or up to two months of free birth control for those without insurance, to users new to their app through the promo code "TrumpCare."

According to 2016 report from the Urban Institute, women who don't have health coverage are less likely to consistently use birth control. In 2016, more than two-thirds of women at risk of unintended pregnancy always used some form of birth control, and more than two-thirds of women also said their birth control was fully covered by their insurance provider. But, women with insurance coverage were much more likely to consistently use birth control than women without coverage. On top of that, the report found that about one in six women had faced some barrier in accessing birth control, including cost and insurance coverage, and uninsured women were twice as likely to experience those barriers. According to 2015 study from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, estimates are that the ACA is saving oral contraceptive users an average of $255 a year and $248 a year for women with an IUD.